Religion

I'm loving this blogger thing. It's freakishly therapeutic for me. Even if there's nothing happening in my life on a certain day, there's plenty of stories in my past to write about. And I've met several folks through this medium that I'd consider friends. At least, if we ever end up sitting in a room face to face, I know conversations would not be dry.

I enjoy clicking on the blogger profiles. I've met several other blogfolks I'd consider agents and I've got to know several church ministers and pastors too. I get a huge kick when their profile says:

Industry: Religion

That says it all for me. Religion IS an industry. Like a product or a widget we followers must churn out from an assembly line. Somehow...I'm convinced Jesus did not intend to create a religion during his three year stint of turning the world upside down. But that's an argument for someone else. I'm a horrible debater so forgive me for those of you who'd love to arm wrestle over this subject.

A few years back I looked up an old college friend on the internet. Al Ginsberg was a student across town at McMurry but we worked together as DJ's at the local NPR affiliate. He was pretty much the anti-christ of our religious infested city. He was one of those rare mixes of 'drug user', 'womanizer', and 'intellectual' all rolled up into one. He told me about growing up around the intellectual drug culture. Like coming home from school as a kid and seeing mom & dad having some new experiment with some friends, etc. I couldn't imagine that. But that was his life. I never did drugs. I was too scared of them. I don't even like taking sinus medication for my allergies. I'd rather not breath than be doped up. But sometimes I give in.

Al was a genius of a doper and I looked like a doper so I guess we were friends. He was a fan of the avant-garde art-rock band I played in and pioneered. When I found him on the internet he emailed me and said he created some sort of internet radio station in Boulder, CO. Sounds like a place he'd end up. He asked what I was doing. I had just started with the izzy group so I told him about it in as non-churchy of a way as possible. It didn't work. His reply: "Well, if religion is your career field then I guess the mother city is the best place to do it".

A sad, sad, but true testimony of the fair mother city...